The family, and especially unborn children, are under attack in Latin America by a number of American anti-life organizations: IPPF, the International Women's Health Coalition, the Population Council, International Projects Assistance Services (IPAS), the Center for Reproductive Law and Policy, Family Care International and many others.

The most powerful and influential anti-life organization working in Latin America and the one that's been working the longest in those countries, is the International Planned Parenthood Federation or IPPF. IPPF Western Hemisphere Region began with the opening of a clinic in Brooklyn,New York in October 1916. That first clinic was founded by Margaret Sanger,the physical and ideological leader of Planned Parenthood. Sanger founded the organization which was originally called American Birth Control League (ABCL). From the beginning, her goal was to reduce the number of people being born, so she championed all forms of birth control, including abortion.1

Sanger was obsessed with sex. Madeline Gray in her 1979 book "Margaret Sanger" illustrates the extent of her emphasis on free sex in quoting a letter Sanger sent her sixteen year old granddaughter: "Kissing, petting and even intercourse are all right...as for intercourse, I'd say three times a day was about right."2 This acceptance of extra-marital sex and even sex among teenagers is characteristic of IPPF's sex education programs.

From the very beginning IPPF was pro-abortion. Its founder, Margaret Sanger, in her first pamphlet (circa 1915), listed the methods of birth control, among which she included abortion. She first advised women to take quinine pills to disturb the uterine lining to prevent implantation and then said specifically : "It takes quinine from four to six days to bring about the desired results, and if one finds a longer time has elapsed and the flow is not brought on, then the only remedy is [a surgical] abortion...Never allow a pregnancy to run over a month. If you are going to have an abortion, make up your mind to do it in the first stages, and have it done."3

While it is true that later on in her career Sanger wrote against abortion, this was a cleverly conceived public relations move to get people to accept her base philosophies. She knew that once sex education and birth control were accepted, abortion would follow. The history of abortion in the U.S. and Canada shows how successful her strategies were. IPPF/WHR and its affiliates follow these same strategies in countries all over the world.4

The IPPF Western Hemisphere Region (WHR) claims to abide by the Mexico City Policy, which forbids the use of tax funds for the promotion or performance of abortions. It does not openly promote abortion legalization in the Hispanic countries. It does however promote the "morning after pill", which it euphemistically calls "emergency contraception". In the late 1960's, IPPF and its friends got some medical associations to define a pregnancy as beginning at implantation, not conception.5

IPPF and its affiliates claim that pregnancy does not begin until the fertilized ovum (a new human life) attaches itself to the wall of the uterus. It wrongly affirms that the morning after pill - which keeps this from happening - does not constitute abortion. The truth is that the IUD, low-dose and mini birth control pills, Depo-Provera, Norplant and morning after pills can and sometimes do cause the death of a unique human being during its first week of existence.6 So in reality, IPPF and its Latin American affiliates, are indeed promoting early abortion in violation of the laws in those countries.

IPPF's true intentions where it concerns the promotion of abortion legalization in the western hemisphere, were apparent at a private fundraising cocktail party in Miami February 11, 2000. Its president, Angela Gomez de Mogollon - IPPF's first Hispanic woman president - complained that abortion is still illegal in Colombia, so IPPF's affiliate there (which believe it or not is called Pro Familia -Pro-Family), cannot provide its full range of "services". She pointed out that there is plenty of work to be done in that respect, not only in Colombia but throughout Latin America. Frankly, I cannot understand how anyone can refer to killing unborn children and damaging women's health through harmful contraceptives, abortifacients, abortion and sterilization, as "services".7

Because IPPF's Western Hemisphere Region supposedly accepts the Mexico City Policy, it relies on two main IPPF affiliates in the U.S. to do the dirty work of promoting abortion legalization in Latin American countries, where for the most part abortion is illegal. Those affiliates are the Planned Parenthood Federation of America through its international arm, Family Planning International Assistance (FPIA), and Margaret Sanger Center International (MSCI), the international arm of Planned Parenthood of New York City. According to Planned Parenthood Federation, if you contribute to the 2002 Annual Fund, you will help fight "the Global Gag Rule" (that is the Mexico City Policy), and support its family planning activities in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean.8

Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA) is the oldest and the largest organization within the IPPF empire. It began in 1916 and is the founding organization.9 While at the present time it is the only family planning association within IPPF that performs surgical abortion, it is clear that IPPF is moving to have more of its family planning associations offer this "service" in the future. The official IPPF document identifying its goals for the year 2000 states that one of its goals is to ensure that "vigorous programs are in place to...increase access to - the deceptively called - safe abortion".10

Family Planning International Assistance Program (FPIA) was started in 1972 by PPFA to "increase awareness of and access to family planning services in developing countries."11 Over the years, PPFA has poured over 285 million into FPIA. In 1994, FPIA assisted 25 projects in 17 countries,including Nicaragua, Bolivia, Ecuador and Mexico. The Nicaragua project according to PPFA in 1993, also provided abortion and MR [menstrual regulation, early abortion] services."12 It is obvious that Planned Parenthood Federation of America, the largest member of IPPF/WHR, is actively exporting its abortion business to other countries in the IPPF/WHR.

Through its "Planned Parenthood Global Partners" international program, Planned Parenthood Federation of America's international service arm, Family Planning International Assistance (FPIA), establishes "partnerships between Planned Parenthood affiliates in the U.S. and family planning programs overseas". For example, the Tampico branch of IPPF's Mexico affiliate, MEXFAM, is receiving assistance from Planned Parenthood of Houston and APROFAM (IPPF's Guatemala affiliate), receives help from Planned Parenthood of Palm Beach, Florida.13 FPIA, working since 1971, was created "to increase access to reproductive health services and strengthen support for reproductive rights in strategically selected countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America and the Caribbean." It supports those organizations that promote "sexuality education and contraceptive services among adolescents" and "safe abortion services". It claims to have received most of its funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development, until the Mexico City policy went into effect in 1986. Planned Parenthood Federation of America lost the federal funding for its international arms because it refused to stop its promotion of abortion.14

Planned Parenthood's Family Planning International Assistance is actively promoting abortion legalization in Latin America. It was among the organizers and co-sponsors of a pro-abortion conference in Cuernavaca, Mexico in November 2001, called "Unwanted Pregnancy and Abortion: Public Health Challenges in Latin America and the Caribbean."15 The program for the conference was painstakingly detailed, as if to design a how-to manual to procure legal abortion in the countries where it is illegal. Laws were reviewed, attitudes were researched and the use of surgical and chemical abortion methods was discussed. Some of the talks given during this three day conference included: "How to manage pain after D&C abortions...", "Cost of maintaining abortion illegal in Chile", "Investigation as a strategy to improve abortion politics in Nicaragua" and "Talking about abortion to diverse audiences" by Frances Kissling, president of Catholics for a Free Choice.16

The other accomplice of IPPF for its underhanded promotion of abortion is Margaret Sanger Center International (MSCI), the "international arm of Planned Parenthood of New York City", which "carries on the global mission of Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger".17 "MSCI operates on the principle of promoting partnerships with local institutions around the world to help strengthen their capacities in education, clinical services, and advocacy for sexual and reproductive health and rights".18 In other words, it promotes in Africa, Asia/Pacific and Latin America/Caribbean, the same evils IPPF and its affiliates promote in the U.S and the rest of the world: hedonistic sex education euphemistically called "family life education", as well as contraception, sterilization, abortifacients, abortion and homosexuality, euphemistically called "sexual and reproductive health and rights issues". MSCI provides "education and training programs on family life development, sexuality, reproductive health, and HIV/AIDS prevention for youth, parent educators, traditional healers, religious organizations and men's groups." It also provides "training related to political advocacy, public policy and communications".19

Planned Parenthood Federation of Canada (PPFC) "raises money for international family planning work" and its international efforts are directed primarily toward Colombia. Other target areas for PPFC are Mexico and the Caribbean.20

What IPPF's cohorts lost in tax funds because of their refusal to stop promoting abortion legalization, American foundations such as David and Lucille Packard, Ford, McArthur, and William and Flora Hewlett, more than made up for. They provide a very large part of the funds being used by IPPF and its affiliates and collaborators, to promote contraception, abortion and hedonistic sex education in Latin America.21

Planned Parenthood's international arm FPIA, received $1,000,0000 in 1999 and $1,000,000 in 2000, from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation for its "international family planning programs."22

Planned Parenthood of New York City received $150,000 in 1999 and $500,000 in 2000 "for the Margaret Sanger Center International", from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation.23

IPPF got from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation for its Latin America and the Caribbean region:

$500,000 in 1999, $600,000 in 2000 and $1,500,000 in 2001. That foundation also gave MEXFAM, IPPF's Mexico affiliate, $300,000 in 1997 and $330,000 in 2000.24

Between 1999 and 2000, the David and Lucile Packard foundation provided almost nine million dollars to anti-life groups and organizations in Mexico. Among them, GIRE (Mexico's main anti-life feminist organization) and Catholics for a Free Choice, which got 3 million of those funds, "to develop a long-term regional plan for improving reproductive rights in Latin America" and $655,000 for a "collaborative reproductive rights initiative focusing on Catholic communities in Mexico". The Mac Arthur Foundation and the Ford Foundation have also given a great deal of financial help to the pro-abortion movement in Mexico.25

The efforts of IPPF and its cohorts have paid off in that country. Abortion was recently legalized in Mexico, in cases of rape and fetal malformation or disease.26 In January 2002, seven of the eleven members of Mexico's Supreme Court, voted in favor of legalizing abortion, in the above mentioned circumstances, by declaring the Robles Reform which had been approved the previous year, constitutional.27 Pro-abortion legislator Rosario Robles (the reform is named for her), claimed : "It is a triumph of the women's movement and an advance of the right to choose".28 IPPF and American foundations helped achieve that tragic triumph of the pro-death forces in Mexico.

Some of the other IPPF funders are United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), World Bank, World Health Organization (WHO), Rockefeller Foundation, Turner Foundation, Comic Relief and many more.29

Note: This article is part of a talk given by Mrs. Llaguno at the American Life League World Conference in New Orleans, July 14, 2002, titled "IPPF in Latin America".